music, therapy, and me

One of the biggest and most important lessons that I have learned over my years as a music therapist is that there are many times where you do not need or even want complex therapeutic music experiences or lots of visual aids or even many different instruments. There are times when simple is better than cool. At my facility, we are in a season of change. This happens every year about this time, but this year's changes seem more abrupt and pervasive than in other years. Every classroom has new staff members. Most of the classrooms have new class members. As a result, music therapy sessions have had to focus more on relationship building and learning how to do things with new people than on our music therapy goals. We have to focus on Maslow's pyramid base right now rather than the upper levels of that pyramid. It is time for meeting physiological needs and basic security needs. So, how do I do this? I go back to my own musical basics - rhythm, parallel play, and working on being...

One of the great things about being an internship supervisor is getting meet many different music therapy interns - getting to know their ways of doing things, figuring out how to teach them things that they need to know, and helping them meet the demands of the professional world through assignments and program expectations. This is also one of the biggest challenges since each person who arrives at my internship is a unique human being who needs different things from me in order to be successful in my program. Now, before we get too much further into this particular topic, let's establish some things. First of all, I fit into the category of old music therapist now. I have been doing this job as a professional just shy of 30 years. It has been about 14 years since I have been in my last educational experience. I have an advanced degree in my chosen profession, and I have been training interns since the last century (barely, but still, things did start up in the 1900's). All o...

Today's randomly selected post to revisit and develop comes to us from the year 2007. Yep, that's right. I've been blogging since the year 2006 here at blogspot and at this site. If you haven't been reading lately, I have decided to revisit old posts on Sundays to see what I was thinking when I was writing over the entire history of this site. To do this, I am using a random number generator that allows me to add in the number of posts that I have at the moment (3,184) and that will select a number for me. I then go into my archived posts to find the number indicated. There is some addition involved in this process, and I enjoy it, so why not? Today's post number is 28, and you can read the post by clicking here . Let's jump into my time machine and see what I felt was important to talk about during August of 2007. Please remember that this was only my 28th post, and I still hadn't quite figured out what I wanted to use this space for in my professional life...

I didn't get a post in early this morning because the Online Conference for Music Therapy took over my brain and my to-do list, but all of that is finished for the day, so I thought I would try writing in the afternoon. I don't often do afternoon posts, mainly because I am more likely to be able to sit down and write in the quiet pre-dawn hours, but today is an exception, so why not? I spent my early morning hours going through several of the forms and emails that I have to send out over the next seven days, and then finished up my "work" time with a training for some of our presenters. I got to train a music therapist from Norway, one from Greece, and another from Japan - all from my home in Kansas, USA. I love this form of interaction, and I am very grateful that I can participate in things like the Online Conference for Music Therapy, Inc. I would never have "met" many of the music therapists that I have interacted with around the world otherwise. I ca...

  I still have no idea what I want to write about this day. I think I am out of personal systems to write about, so will this theme actually continue? Who knows? Definitely, not me!! I am tired of doing the same old thing, especially when it becomes a chore rather than a joy to write. Ooh. I could go back to my music therapy stories and share them on Fridays. I haven't written much new lately, but I also haven't shared what I have written. This could become Fiction Fridays... Ooh. That is really sending a thrill up my spine. So, if you haven't been around, I've been playing along with the idea that I can write stories. I'm not sure that I can, but I'm having fun, and that's the most important part of all of this - finding fun. I am writing three different story threads that all fit together in my brain. The first story is about a music therapy student in the year 2049. The second is about a person called "The Heretic," and the third story is about ...

I applied for a position with an organization about a month ago. The job was supposed to start on January 3rd, but the application deadline was extended until December 30th, so a start date of January 3rd was no longer really realistic. I submitted my information twice because I never received an acknowledgement of my application the first time and was concerned that they had not received it. The next step, once I received an acknowledgement of my application (had to ask for it), was that another person would be moving forward on the process. Since then, absolutely nothing has been communicated. There has been no announcement about anyone else getting the job, but everything has been silent. This is frustrating for me because I am living in a world of doubt at the moment. I am not good with other people being in charge of aspects of my life. I don't know if I should give up or just continue to hope that this opportunity will come. I have had no interaction with anyone other than th...

 It is snowing outside, and I am hoping for a snow day. It is Wednesday, so my schedule includes six groups and a dyad that will end up being an individual session because one of the partners was horrible yesterday, so no extra music therapy time. There are three weather alerts going on right now, and there are only six closings. I guess I will have to head out into the slick world to go to work. I'm not looking forward to anything about this day. To be honest, I am not sure if I will stay home either way. My head hurts so much right now, and my body is creaking. If we have a regular school day today, then I have physical behavior management training to do, and my body just won't handle it. If we don't have school today, then I can postpone all that for another week.  There are more closings happening right now, which is a good thing, but nothing down by work. Five of our districts served are closed which means that those students will not be attending. That is helpful, but...

One of the most challenging aspects of being an internship director is the application process. I have set up my application to test several different aspects of an applicant's attention span, ability to follow directions, and attention to detail. Lately, applicants have not been doing well with these things and that is changing how I evaluate their applications. I am not inviting as many applicants to interview with me because of these things. My biggest peeve when it comes to applications is the "you forgot to ask for this" applicant. This is the applicant who thinks I "forgot" to ask for transcripts and resumes, sends those things, and tells me that I "forgot." I didn't. I don't find them helpful at all, so I don't ask for them. Transcripts come with a cost for the music therapy student, and I don't find any sort of valuable information included in that document. I don't "forget" anything about my application process - ...

Today's adventure into the past is somewhat grief inducing as it was written two days before my father died, but at the same time, it is also important to revisit. Here's the post from that date...  Why Is Day Two ALWAYS Harder Than Day One?? January 05, 2021 I did everything that I wanted to do last evening. I got home, spent some time organizing my space and evening, and I did all the things. I finished sing about april - (you could purchase it here , if you want...). I found out that our Monthly Music Therapy Meets have been approved for CMTEs - no revisions!! Boom! I was also asked to develop a course for a different online platform. Eeeee! I was out of my bed until 7:50 and then fell asleep pretty easily. That's where the good things kinda stopped. All night, I woke up and struggled with getting back to sleep. I don't know if I was dreaming or startling myself awake or responding to hot flashes, but I woke up about five times that I re...

I had Monday off from work. That made this week seem indeterminably long. It always happens that way. I am never really sure why, but having Monday off makes Tuesday through Friday just drag on and on... My week was full of watching my intern lead sessions, leading my own sessions, and lots and lots of thinking. This past four days was not a "doing" time, but was a thinking time. I did put together a paper bag junk journal for a co-worker's birthday. It turned out pretty well, and she's an art therapist so she will use it for all sorts of things. I am having fun making things for other people. Everyone is getting some sort of homemade gift from me, and I am using up some of my stuff in the process! That is the best part of all for me - using up stuff!! My interest in papercrafting stems from my interest in books. I like books in all sorts of forms. I like hardbacks and paperbacks, blank books and picture books. Books are a part of my necessities all the time. It is ra...

Usually, on Fridays, I write a bit about the systems that I have set up so I can work smarter rather than harder, but I am at a loss right now for something to write about. I've covered color-coding, visual aid boxes, organization, bullet journaling, time blocking, session strategizing, therapeutic music experience development, super-sticky post-it notes, and all of the other things I can think of, but I think I am at the end of my systems. Maybe it is time to start another series. I want to write something that will help other people find and keep their way into and through this profession. I do my best writing (in my opinion, anyway) when I am writing about the peripheral things that music therapists have to do in their roles - the stuff that we don't really talk about during our coursework. These are the things, that during internships, we call "administrative duties." These are the things that have to happen for a successful music therapy practice to happen - the ...

I have an hour before I have to head out into my bigger world. I woke up with a sore throat which can mean just about anything around me - strep, allergies, too much dry air. I am not running a temperature, so I'm thinking this is more allergies or dry air than anything else. Who knows? My life, at the moment, is just focused on getting my medicated body to work and back again. I am not really sure what to write about this morning, but I feel the need to write. I am not really immersed in any of the things happening in the music therapy world right now other than the Online Conference for Music Therapy, Inc which seems to be only music therapy thing in my life right now. That is not uncommon for me in January and February, but I am sure that there are other things happening in the world of music therapy. I have another thing to put on my list of music therapy to-dos, but I am happy about this one. I need to figure out when I will do all of the things on my music therapy to-do list....

One of my favorite pieces of music is Into the Unknown by Panic at the Disco. This is the piece that is in the end credits of the movie, Frozen 2 , and it strikes a chord with me in ways that I find difficult to explain. I mean, I like the version that Idina Menzel sings in the movie, but this is the version that energizes every cell in my body. I am trying my best to step into the unknown this year. It is part of my interpretation of my word of the year, Transform. I am making an effort to do things that either I have never done or that I have been putting off. So, here it goes. I found out this weekend that I have been accepted to present a continuing music therapy education (CMTE) course on one of my passion topics - competency-based clinical training. Now, I just need to have five people sign up and then it's a go! I was accepted to do a workshop at the World Congress of Music Therapy in July this year on another of my passion projects - the future of music therapy. I am starti...

Do you memorize music easily? I do, and it seems that my method of memorizing music isn't all that prevalent out there in the music therapy world, so let me tell you how I do things... I find patterns. Okay. I know what you're thinking... "Sure, MJ, that sounds easy enough, but how does that help me memorize music?" Now, I find that people who did not grow up with piano lessons and who learned to play guitar before piano tend to do this easier than those who are pianists. There seems to be something inherently different in how we learn to play those two instruments that affects how we can memorize things. If you feel differently, please let me know in comments. This is my experience over 35 interns, two organists, and lots of music therapy professionals. I don't know what it is exactly about piano and guitar that tend to send us into different ways of memorizing things, but that seems to be the learning that happens. Back to how I memorize music. I learn the patte...

This morning's post is from July 2013 , selected from the random number generator, and an interesting post because it was right before my very first surgery. I wasn't feeling well, and the topic is all about relaxation.  As I re-read it, I am both taken back to that period of time and struck by how much I write about relaxation. My definition of relaxation is something that seems unattainable and has for a very long time. So, I guess it is time to change my definition of relaxation. July 2013 was an interesting time in my life. I had diverticulitis, a recurring infection (that we found out later was from drinking the water at work - go figure), and eventually had to have 13 inches of my intestine removed - in fact, it was about two weeks after this post that I ended up in surgery. It was an interesting time. I had never had a surgery before, and I was scared spitless. My mom came to help me (and to make sure that I actually went through with it), the water in my apartment becam...

I am currently stressed and crabby as all get out because I made a mistake and then was called out on that mistake in a way that was a bit less grace-filled and more confrontational and I am not happy with myself or the person who called me out. This may be currently affected by my medication side effects - I feel more negative emotions when under the influence than when I am not, so I may be able to forgive myself more readily in a couple of hours than right now. Right now, however, I am stuck in the throes of self-hatred because making mistakes is not something that I like AT ALL and I REALLY don't like being called out in this particular manner which just rubs me the wrong way EVERY SINGLE TIME! Does anyone else just find making mistakes humiliating? I am my own worst critic and there are times when making any sort of misstep sends me into a spiral of shame and humiliation. All self-imposed and all just ridiculous when I get over myself and everything. I talk to my interns and t...